NEXT STEPS

The GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP) is often called the premium open source image manipulation project. Version 2.0 was released in February 2004, and now GIMP 2.2 is available. This article looks at GIMP’s progress over the past year.

For the major release of GIMP 2.0, the GIMP developers [1] basically rewrote the program. The new structure was designed to provide a framework that would bring more efficiency to ongoing development work. With GIMP 2.2, the GIMP developers have been able to harvest the first fruits of all that hard work with an improved GUI and new plugins. Installation As of this writing, even many of the most recent distributions do not include GIMP 2.2. You’ll find a binary package with Suse Linux 9.1. If you use another distribution, you will need to build the GIMP from the source code, and this means you will need the libraries listed in Box 1. You can obtain GIMP 2.2 from the GIMP website at [1].

Many users turn to GIMP for pictures in the window, but some may not realize GIMP also has scripting capabilities that allow you to automate recurring tasks. The Python scripting language is a useful alternative to the GIMP’s integrated Lisp dialect.